


Fifteen

by kurgaya



Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Friendship, Sorry Not Sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-26
Updated: 2013-04-26
Packaged: 2017-12-09 13:58:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/774995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kurgaya/pseuds/kurgaya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A child went to war and a child didn't come back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fifteen

**Author's Note:**

> I like killing characters far too much.

Nobody had expected it would end like this.

The war had been brutal, _far_ more brutal than they'd ever fathomed it could be, and the fighting had dragged them through the screams and mutilated bodies for a long and bloody month. Aizen had been cruel, so cruel, but Yamamoto had responded in kind, refusing to bow down even when the blade of defeat had been hovering over his neck. The casualties were infinite, the ground beneath their swollen feet had drained the life force out of ever solider to feed the starving and withered men in the ranks behind. The prospect for an early salvation had dwindled in the first week, and the desperation for a honourable fight in the second. Massacres and assassinations were not the shinigami way; you did not attack when a back was turned, and that, ultimately, had been their undoing.

Toshiro had known the end had come the moment he fell to his knees in the rain, his friends and comrades indistinguishable from the mud splattered across his sickly face, and lain a ghostly hand atop the shreds of Ichigo Kurosaki's shihakusho. The substitute coughed a wet, harsh complaint when his uniform was peeled back, and Toshiro wiped his bloodshot eyes in the hopes that what he was seeing was just a figment of his tired, traumatised mind. The side of the man's torso was gaping open like a mouth, skin and muscle hanging like a thick, thirsty tongue, and bone jutting out like teeth. The stench of the blood still being vomited out from the wound was foul, and Toshiro knew he'd carry it all the way home like the puke of a man who'd had too much to drink. Ichigo's eyes were dazed and the turn of his head sluggish; obscure words were slurred out from between his trembling, dry lips.

"Don't talk you imbecile," the taicho snapped, chanting the most powerful healing kido he could manage. Ichigo choked and heaved a laugh, the air from one lung not enough to satisfy his amusement, and jerked helplessly into a spasm of coughs, tears dribbling down his cheeks and blood spraying from his mouth. He blubbered something between every horrible gasp, his eyes alert now, acutely aware of the endless abyss his body was sinking into, and filled with so much pain that Toshiro couldn't bear to look.

He did though, not in a morbid fascination of a dying teenager, but in respect for the terrified plea he could feel in the hand scrabbling at his leg like an animal trapped between the jaws of the inevitable predator. The temptation to turn towards the victorious buzzing of the spiritual energy behind him and scream for help was unlike any emotion Toshiro had ever known, and Ichigo fell quiet as if to give him the chance to raise his voice above the impermeable silence that the war had forsaken them to. He knew it would be hopeless though; his own spiritual energy was running low in his frantic attempt to heal his comrade; the soft green light of the kido was dimming, and Ichigo's breaths were shortening, _dying_ with it.

"Mum's gonna be mad," Ichigo rasped, his words hardly audible. The hole in his side gave another lurch and blood spewed all over Toshiro's knees. "She's gonna be so mad, _oh my_ \- " His sob exploded into a cough, and the kido flickered when the taicho reached over to lay a hand on the other's head.

"She won't be," Toshiro reassured, gently patting down the tangled ginger hair. "She won't be, I promise."

"O-okay," came the little agreement, the thin voice of the child almost happy. "Trust you 'shiro."

Toshiro was still nodding when the green light faded away. Toshiro was still crying when he leaned over to protect Ichigo's smile from the rain.


End file.
